Page 2 of Chasing Hope

“Physically, she’s fine. Emotionally, on the other hand…”

My eyes rake over the apartment Caleb and I share, as if I’ll find answers between the sofa cushions. My feet begin to move of their own accord, pacing around the large gray couch.

“What happened?” I hear myself ask, but I sound far away, my voice cold and detached despite feeling anything but. It’s clipped, precise, sterile—I sound like my father.

If I wasn’t so focused on Evie right now, I’d shudder at the thought, but when it comes to her, I’ve always had tunnel vision.

My best friend’s little sister, the girl I watched grow into a woman, the one that I would throw myself in front of a movingcar for, take a bullet for, stab myself in the heart for if it meant saving her.

I would doanythingfor her.

And something tells me I’m about to prove just how true that statement is.

“I swear to God, man, if I weren’t in London right now sitting on the tarmac I would be on a flight back to Colorado.” He sighs again, the venom in his voice intensifying with every passing word. “Evie just called me hysterical; I could barely understand a word. I thought she got in an accident or something happened to our parents.”

“She didn’t, did she?”

“No, but I don’t think what happened is any better. She got fired from her job, fuck knows why. Before I could ask her about it, she said she went home early and caught Carter balls deep in another woman.”

My body freezes, my eyes slamming closed as all the air in my lungs evaporates.

I knew he was cheating and I was the bastard that was too cowardly to tell Evie. I tried to go about it anonymously, the old-fashioned way, hiring a PI and mailing photos of him out at “work lunches” with his female coworker where he just so happened to shove his tongue down her throat.

I’m presuming she never got them. Perhaps Carter got the mail first and threw the pictures out, or worse, Evie saw them and chose to stay. But if she’s this hysterical over catching him in bed with another woman, then I’m leaning toward the former.

“Fuck,” I curse, running a hand through my hair.

“Fuck indeed.”

A commotion comes over the line, a woman’s voice in a soft lilting British accent saying, “Sir, you can’t be on the phone. We’re taking off.”

“Just give me one minute please.”

“Sir, I must ask that you kindly hang up?—”

My body unfreezes, my pacing resuming as a million thoughts begin to churn, every single one of them about her. Always her. “Don’t worry, Ellington, I’ve got her. I’ll head over and make sure he doesn’t do anything stupid.”

“I’m not worried abouthimdoing something stupid, Valenti.”

“Sir, if you don’t put the phone away, I’ll be forced to?—”

“Yes, yes, I’m turning it off, okay? I’m sorry, it’s a family emergency.”

I place my phone in the crook of my shoulder as I rush to grab my keys and slip my feet into sneakers. “Ellington, I’ve got it, okay? Don’t worry, I’ll bring her back here and take care of her until we can talk again.”

He groans, the sound full of pain and a heavy weariness. I don’t even have to see him to know he’s sitting in that chair, knees bouncing a mile a minute. He’s always been fiercely protective of her, more so since she’s pulled away from the family.

It’s no doubt killing him to be stuck on that plane.

“Thanks, man.”

“Anytime.”

Caleb pauses. “Feel free to punch the fucker for me.” And with that, he disconnects the call.

My fingers drum the wheel relentlessly as I curse this godforsaken slow garage gate. Peeking back down at the last text Caleb sent before the flight attendant probably confiscated his phone or threw him off the plane, I reread the instructions on how to get into Evie and her—I’m praying—ex-boyfriend’s apartment.

The code to get access to the parking garage was easy to memorize considering it was playing on a loop in my mind while driving here.